Abstract Why do perceivers categorize and stereotype others by their biological sex and age? We suggest that perceivers do so because sex and age interactively shape adaptive goals (e.g., mating, parenting) and strategies. And because such goals and strategies pose different fitness-relevant opportunities and threats, social perceivers use others' sex-age as a cue for predicting others' behaviors. This perspective has multiple implications, which we test in a range of U.S. undergraduate and online survey samples. First, we find that perceivers categorize others not by sex and age independently, but by the interaction of their sex and age (i.e., people mentally group others as females and males of specific ages) (Studies 1 and 2). Second, perceivers hold stereotypes of men and women of specific ages as being differentially oriented towards short- and long-term mating as well as parenting goals (e.g., women are stereotyped to be more oriented towards long-term mating goals than men are, but only at younger ages) (Studies 3 and 4). Finally, providing perceivers with direct information about others' adaptive goals can influence the extent to which perceivers apply stereotypes of agency, communion, and competence, and can even override typical sex stereotypes (e.g., men are generally stereotyped to be more agentic than women, but this sex stereotype disappears when both men and women are presented as engaging in short-term mating goals) (Studies 5 and 6). The current findings challenge existing thinking about sex and age stereotyping, and demonstrate the value of an adaptationist approach for thinking about social perception and stereotypes.

中文翻译：

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性别年龄刻板印象：作为非专业适应主义者的社会感知者

摘要 为什么感知者会根据生理性别和年龄对他人进行分类和刻板印象？我们建议感知者这样做是因为性别和年龄会相互作用地塑造适应性目标（例如，交配、养育子女）和策略。由于这些目标和策略会带来不同的与健康相关的机会和威胁，社会感知者使用他人的性别年龄作为预测他人行为的线索。这种观点具有多重含义，我们在一系列美国本科生和在线调查样本中进行了测试。首先，我们发现感知者不是根据性别和年龄独立地对他人进行分类，而是根据他们的性别和年龄的相互作用（即人们在心理上将他人分为特定年龄的女性和男性）（研究 1 和 2）。第二，感知者认为特定年龄的男性和女性对短期和长期交配以及养育目标的取向不同（例如，女性被刻板印象比男性更倾向于长期交配目标，但仅在年龄较小）（研究 3 和 4）。最后，向知觉者提供关于他人适应目标的直接信息可以影响知觉者应用能动性、交流和能力的刻板印象的程度，甚至可以超越典型的性别刻板印象（例如，男性通常被认为比女性更具能动性，但是，当男性和女性都参与短期交配目标时，这种性别刻板印象就会消失（研究 5 和 6）。目前的发现挑战了现有的关于性别和年龄刻板印象的想法，